For Tania Hernández Vicencio, researcher and founder of Permanent Seminar on Rights in Mexicothe reforms are “little new”, since since 2001 there had been statutory changes, opening to new militancy, citizen or external candidacies and elections of candidates through surveys that resulted in a sustained decline in both supporters and votes.
“Let’s start from the fact that National Action has not been in crisis since the last election (2024) or even the 2018 election, but from the moment it became a federal government,” he says in an interview.
These changes to its official documents occur in the midst of the debacle that the party has had in the last six years, in which they lost more than 5 million votes, the governorships of seven states, 26% of their membership and more than 10 seats.
Within the same party, there are conflicting opinions, between those who consider that there are no fundamental changes in the proposal and those who propose that a change is needed.
Adriana Dávila, who competed for the PAN leadership in 2024 alongside Romero, points out that there are no substantive changes in the main document of the political party.
“(The reforms) do not touch on issues that are obviously fundamental to demonstrate a change, which they also proposed. What we are seeing is that they continue exactly the same things that were already there with some different wording,” he says.
For its part, Luis Felipe Bravo Menaformer national president of the PAN, assures that the 2024 electoral results and the alliances with parties that at some point were political rivals, meant that the new leadership had to give a “turn of the helm” for a reinvention that goes beyond the logo.
“The way of voting (in 2024) told us that it was not what people liked, we need to rebuild on the basis of social equity, social justice and not only on electoral rules,” he says.
Changes like Morena’s
Among the modifications being promoted there are rules similar to those of Morena, such as the conducting surveys to elect contenders for elected office, the formation of local groups for political actions and the prohibition of nepotism for candidacies, as well as sanctioning those who “defame” or “slander” another PAN member.
About the choice of contendersthe party promotes that they be elected not only by its members, but by citizens in general. For this there will be two ways: ordinary and extraordinary.
The first method includes primary elections open to citizens, surveys administered by the PAN and an internal voting process among militants. The second consists of direct appointment by party bodies and operates only in cases of death, illness, resignation or failure to locate a previously chosen candidate.
The PAN had already resorted to primary elections to define its presidential candidate. In 2005, Alberto Cárdenas —former member of former President Vicente Fox’s cabinet—, Santiago Creel —backed at the time by the head of the Executive— and Felipe Calderón, who won the internal race and later the Presidency of the Republic, participated.
In 2012 the method was repeated with the contest between Santiago Creel, as representative of the Foxist current; Ernesto Cordero, former member of Felipe Calderón’s cabinet, and Josefina Vazquez Mota, winner of the presidential candidacy.
For the Right Seminar researcher, the primary elections were already proven mechanisms that left internal confrontations, while the survey method has also been carried out with results in favor of the political group that controls the party.
The PAN members already have the experience, they already have the diagnosis and they are already 15 years late
Tania Hernández, researcher at the Right Seminar
It is also prohibits nepotism in the candidacies starting with the 2027 elections, which is to a similar extent to what Morena adopted this same year.
However, the PAN members establish an exception to this rule, since it is mentioned that it will not apply to those people who demonstrate a recognized career in the political, social or public service sphere or who have won an executive or legislative election in the area of interest.
Although this restriction is already provided for in the Constitution, its application is scheduled for 2030, so PAN – like Morena – is ahead of that deadline.
Other adjustments are to strengthen the party structure heading into the next midterm elections. Among them, it is incorporated as obligation of militancy participate as a box representative when the party requires it. The measure responds to the 2024 election, when the PAN only managed to accredit representatives in around 40% of the country’s polling stations; That is to say, the majority did not have their own presence to monitor election day.
They create the “homogeneous groups” of militants, who will be in charge of carrying out political activities of an electoral nature in communities, similar to those that make up Morena and the PRI for their territorial political organization, but these parties call them sectional committees.
The new PAN guidelines contemplate actions for indiscipline, defamation, slander or attacks between militants or leaders, as the Morena party approved this year in its statutes. These acts of indiscipline will be punished with a reprimand, deprivation of office or party commission, cancellation of candidacy and disqualification from being a leader or contender and even expulsion from the party.
Despite the similarities with what is established with other parties, Bravo Mena considers that the new statutes of the party seek to renew the way in which democratic life is discussed and approved both within the blue and white, and abroad.
He assures that renewal was a natural and necessary movement for internal and external democratic life and that current times need new ideas, younger people with broader visions.
It must be an alternative that is capable of returning to democratic life in Mexico, but not with the same previous bases that citizens already know.
Luis Felipe Bravo Mena, former leader of the PAN.
